Spear of the Storms
by mgunh1
Summary: A young Initiate of the Machine dedicates himself to repairing a mechanical saviour of an race known as the Ancients, knowing it could be the last thing he ever does as a war brews between two rival specie, both using weapons far beyond their knowledge.
1. Prologue

**Author's note: To us, any measurements are in the Metric system.**

**I do not own yadda, yadda, yadda. I can't be bothered listing how many things this is inspired from, so I won't even try. Just know that I don't own 'em, unless it is actually mine ^^**

Prologue

The expedition had gone exceedingly well. The new automobiles, dubbed the Peeja after the jungle insect of the same name, had been a great help cutting through the Cavanti Jungles and the lost temple now stood before them. Locan Kalito had never seen anything like it, never in all his years as an archaeologist. Standing some twenty metri high, it was the biggest pyramid he had ever seen. Sure, there were undoubtedly much larger ones in the Jara Desert, but his one was special. All the rest in the records had been four sided, square based temples. Some had been places of worship, others tombs. Some had even been literal death traps for would-be grave robbers. But this, this was the first ever to have a triangular base and, to top it off, if the measurements were to be trusted, the entire thing was equilateral; who ever had made this had to have been amazing mathematicians.

Locan and his pack began to search for a way in. Most of the lower section was covered in plant growth, a testament to just how old it was. Interestingly, none of the plants had managed to pierce through the stone. While that in itself was a mystery enough, it was not why they had come. There was a shout and Locan came running. He was met by excited workers and he knew what they were about to say before it had even emerged from their lungs.

"Sir! We found it, sir! The entrance!" He scrambled down the 'moat' (he had laughed at the name the workers had given it once, but that was before he nearly drowned in a flash flood whilst working in it). He subconsciously noted that the pyramid must have been much larger and older than they had guessed, given that they were standing on the top step to the door way, about 6 metri down, after nearly a month of digging. He whistled, he was NOT expecting this. Standing before him were two steel doors, exactly 2 metri high, as one of the workers near him noted aloud. He placed a grimy hand on the doorway in amazement, his four digits leaving muddy smears on the already soil stained steel. He scratched behind one ear as he turned to the pack.

"Well, what you lot waiting for?! Get that door open! NOW!" He barked at them. He moved aside as the workers tried to find a way through. After a few minutes of frantic searching, there was an elated cry from one of the workers, then a 'ta-dah!' as the doors opened by themselves. Locan looked over at the one who had found out how to open the doors. He tried to recall his name, 'A something… Vanus? Domi Vanus? Dorsa Vanus?' He resolved to ask later, right now a completely new discovery waited inside, just for his expertise.

As they walked inside, a few of the workers lit torches, their flickering lights making ghosts of the shadows. The short corridor opened up into what he guessed was a massive antechamber. As he walked inside, his foot knocked against something. Curious, he bent down, expecting some sort of tribal trinket, or some sort. As he lifted it into the light, his entire face drained. It definably wasn't some tribal ornament, though just what it was, he reckoned, could keep researchers guessing for hundreds of years. 'That is, of course,' he thought to himself, 'if we don't find out right now…' Noticing that the rounded, oblong object seemed to have some kind of button, he pressed it, not really expecting anything to happen. However, his expectations were proved false, as the entire room lit up, revealing that the room was filled with all kinds of things, stuff that seemed to have jumped straight out of some science fiction novella, that was all the rage with the younglings these days. However, when he looked up, he was in for the greatest shock of his entire career, an event that would change the direction of, not just his fate, but also the fate of the entire world.


	2. Chapter 1

**What, no reviews? Well, I guess I'm not totally surprised, not many people write fanfics for MLaaTR. Still... hmm... maybe the prologue wasn't very promising, and many of you readers (if there are any ;-; ) are probably wondering when Jenny and the gang will show up, eh? Well, I can't say without spoiling up-coming chapters xD However, Jenny will appear, err... soon :P**

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"And that discovery was…?" The student groaned, they must have gone over this a thousand times, at least.

"Locan looked up and saw the Ancient blue knight, pierced by the three Spears of the Storm." He intoned with a steady, monotonous voice, betraying his utter boredom. He placed one furred paw over his short snout, stifling a yawn, "He also went on to find the lower chambers, without which our kind would never have risen to the technological heights that we now aspire to." He sighed, "Master, must we go over this? This is first level stuff! I'm fifth level now, reaching my seventeenth solar cycle, I might add."

"My dear Valmos," The one dubbed 'master' replied, "you are nearing your Rites. These are things that they will interrogate you about, and yes, the testing is that bad." He sighed and put down the heavy tome, the wood backing making an audible thump on the desk, "I know this is hard, all this revision, but you will thank me for it after you pass the testing."

"You sound so sure I will." The student replied, chuckling. The Master smiled warmly, the fur under his old, wise eyes bunching up, like the tail of a Rahbito.

"In that, at least, I have no doubt." He replied, "As long as you study hard enough. Talking about your upcoming Rites, have you thought about what you would like to dedicate your work to?" Valmos cringed slightly; he'd been dreading this question.

"To be honest, Master, I have no idea…" He glanced around at the tomes on the shelves, "It seems that most of the work has already been done by others. Anything I would be doing would merely end up being me reading their work. I want to do something worthwhile, something new." The Master chuckled at this.

"Oh to be young again…" He muttered, "Hmm… what about the airship program? Last I heard, they were looking for assistance."

"From alchemists." Valmos stood and wandered over to the books, brushing the odd one that had accumulated dust, "They banned any manned missions until they can find a new power source. Seems wood and coal ain't going to do it…"

"Ah." The Master walked over to Valmos, "Well, our time is up, I'll see you again next week. I want you to read up on your Ancient history until then, ok? And try to think up something to dedicate yourself too, it is a required part of the Rites."

"Yes sir." He replied turning to see the Master walk out of Valmos's study, his symbiotic machine arm closing the heavy wood door with a light click as the auto locks slid into place, hidden in the stone wall. Valmos gazed out the window to the city. From his vantage point, he looked out north, past the town centre to where the Jara desert would be if he had the eyes of an Ezgal.

The city would seem to be what one would consider some where between the Victorian and Industrial Revolution styles, though Valmos knew not of any of that. Tall wood and stone manors rose in the east, ranging in deep rose to night black in colour. To the west stood strange, mechanical constructs; the automated construction yards that provided the city, indeed all their towns and cities, with power, tools and luxuries. These manufacturing plants where based, mostly in spirit, on the plans of the Ancients, adapted to what they could make. Many of the factories were due to be demolished by the end of the year, to be replaced by cleaner, smaller and far more efficient varieties; those that were more like the ones the Ancients had designed.

The temple that Valmos had called home for the past five cycles was built to surround the ancient pyramid and was the southern most point in the city. Beyond that was the Cavanti Jungle, or what was left of it after the expansion of the settlement to accommodate a growing population. It was only in the last decade that research into conservation became mainstream and the deforestation of the jungles was halted, replaced by the harvesting of plantation wood. After the research of the Ancients into genetic engineering had been discovered, plantation wood was now, arguably, of a far higher quality than anything you can find in the wild.

Valmos checked the clock and swore – he had spent far too long thinking and was running late. He had arranged to meet with his friends at the pyramid at three hours past midday and it was already ten past. He took a last minute check in his mirror, before heading out. Bright blonde fur sprouted from the end of his short snout, crowned his head and his ears and trailed down his spine, terminating at the base of his tail. He attempted to get some of his tail fur in order, but it stubbornly refused to co-operate. The rest of him was a dark brown colour, excluding a small, triangular patch of white on his chest. He sighed; it would just have to do. He raced down the stairs and out of the dorms.

---

Racing across the courtyard, Valmos spotted his friends waiting for him by the entrance to the pyramid. He slowed down and waved to them, thankful that they had waited. The two of them waved back. Neva shouted out to him as he got closer, "Where have you been? We've been waiting forever!"

Valmos chuckled to himself. The tall, blue-grey female was the most boisterous of them and always the first to speak up. She, like all of them, was dressed in the traditional dark red robe of the academy, with a blue triangle emblazoned on the left breast, something, he noticed with a slight blush (thankfully hidden under his fur), that she had begun to fill out. "Master had me going through some last minute stuff." It wasn't a total lie, but he didn't want to say he'd half-forgotten about it.

Braken, a slightly shorter male, but much stockier than Valmos, groaned. He had pure black fur, with a smidgeon of red on the ends of his ears. "Whatever. Look, I have to do some sort of maintenance 'tour' in the lower sections before we hit the markets and I need you to look after my bro." He shot a look at Neva, before continuing, "Remember what happened last time I let Neva look after Tulare?" Valmos shuddered; it had taken them hours to unglue Tulare from the ceiling.

"Yeah, true." Valmos looked around, but couldn't see him, "Speaking of the devil, where is he?"

"He's inside." Braken shrugged, "You know how he is."

Valmos nodded, "Unfortunately, yes, I do." Braken punched him lightly for the jest as they wandered inside. It wasn't hard to see the little red tyke, he was a lot like his brother, only he was a fair touch more red, having the fawn coloured stain run right down his chest and coat the paws on his feet like socks. He was wearing a pair of kaki shorts, his favourite if Valmos remembered correctly, and a simple white shirt.

"VALY!" Came the high-pitched cry of the pup as the little terror came running for them. Valmos groaned, he was stuck with this little ten cycle menace.

"Ok, you go Braken, but don't take too long, ok?" Neva said, echoing my thoughts.

Braken laughed, "I not THAT evil am I?"

"I'll refrain from answering that." Valmos shot back as Braken headed down the stairs at the far end. Valmos took this time to have a look around the pyramid; it really was a thing of beauty, even with the somewhat gruesome display hanging above them.

Suspended by three spears, often called the three Spears of the Storm for their habit of giving anyone near-by a rather nasty static shock, was a blue and white machine. It was vaguely shaped like what he thought one of the Ancients would look like, which wasn't such a wild guess, given the drawings around them. He glanced at them, although he didn't need to read them as he knew the story off by heart.

The Ancients had built the Blue Knight as a saviour of their people and had imbued it with the mind of a living being. It lived as one of them, but had the task of also protecting them from outside threats. However, one day one of these threats, known to Valmos's people as the 'Yellow Queen', named after how she was depicted in the drawings, came and infected the Blue Knight, turning her (Most thought it was female, though no-one really knew what the Ancients looked like) into a mindless killing machine. One of the Ancients sacrificed his own existence to become a new saviour, who Valmos's people had called the Silver Knight. The Silver Knight engaged the Blue Knight in combat, giving time for the Ancients to build great sky boats, with which they escaped into the stars. Seeing that they had fled, the Silver Knight pierced the Blue Knight with the three spears and imprisoned her in this pyramid. After which, the Silver Knight when into mourning and built a second pyramid, one with five sides, in which he placed himself.

As Valmos was remembering the tale, Neva came up beside him. "You know, I think he loved her." At this, Valmos looked up.

"I'm sorry?"

"Look, you see this scene?" She pointed to the one that depicted the Silver Knight being made from an Ancients body. "Do you the brown fur on his head?" Valmos nodded, unsure where she was going with it, "Well, look at the ones before him. In all of them, there is that brown haired male, you see?"

"Yeah… But that doesn't-"

"Look here, when she first kills, he is there." She continued, ignoring him, "All the rest run, but he is there, kneeling."

"But, that could also mean that he felt for the one that had died." Valmos retorted.

"True, but wouldn't he be looking at the dead body, not the Blue Knight, if that were the case?" Valmos tried to reply, but something clicked in his head. She was right.

"No… Really? Damn... I think you're right." He said, a slight amount of awe filtering into his voice. "That would make sense as to the reason for the mourning scene."

"Exactly!" She replied, happy that someone had agreed with her view. Valmos looked up to the suspended body.

"Then, would be not reasonable that he didn't actually kill her?"

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"Well, if he had actually killed her, then why the spears?" Valmos asked, "Wouldn't it be more practical to just lay her on a table of some sort?"

"I guess, but his could have been how they respected their dead…"

"By spearing them through the torso, suspended in the air?" Valmos scoffed, "Sounds more like disrespect, to me. Moreover, if he loved her, then why disrespect her dead form? And what about the electric charge on the spears? We know for a fact that an electric discharge will temporarily disable any logic engine, even the one down stairs that the Ancients made. And, given that that logic engine was able to self repair after a few blundering researchers managed to damage it when it was first discovered, couldn't the Blue Knight have that ability too?"

"So… you're saying that she could still be alive?!" Neva exclaimed, a mixture of shock and excitement quite evident in her voice.

Valmos shrugged, "Maybe… It is just a theory, after all, using the assumption that you are correct too. Besides, we never found that second pyramid. So who can say that even the drawings are correct, hmm?" Neva's excitement waned and her shoulders visibly sagged.

"I guess you are right. But, still, it is a nice idea; think of what we could learn from her…"

"Hey, I'm done!" Came the gruff shout from the stairs and the black form of Braken emerged, "C'mon Tu…lare? Hey, where's my brother?" Valmos and Neva collectively groaned, they'd both forgotten about him.

"I'm sure he's around here somewhere…" Neva supplied, "TULARE! Where'd you go?!"

"I'm right here!" Came the reply, as the little tyke wandered back in through the main entrance, "I was just playing outside. I got bored."

"Ok, we ready to go?" Valmos asked, eager to change the subject.

"Yeah, lets head off." Braken said, hefting a bag over his shoulder, "I heard that one of the traders had come all the way from the Jara Desert!"

"Isn't that where the Jaracanti live?" Valmos asked.

"Uh, yeah. What tipped you off?" Neva replied, jokingly.

"I heard that they're no better than tribal savages." Tulare commented.

"They're not that bad." Neva replied, "But they're still no-where near the level of technology that we Valantie have achieved, thanks to the Ancients."

"Hurry up guys! If we don't get a move on, all the good traders will be gone!" Braken said, breaking into a run as the academy doors neared. Neva laughed.

"Race you!" She said as she ran after Braken.

"No fair, you got a head start!" Valmos replied, sprinting after her. Tulare ran after them, falling behind quickly.

"Hey! Wait for me!"


End file.
